Monday 30 March 2020

Unit 7 - Lesson 4. The Palaeolithic period: economy

Today's lesson corresponds to pages 108-109 of your book.

First of all, we must study some vocabulary:
  • A shelter: a safe place where the elements (wind, rain, cold...) don't affect you. You can use a cave or a tree... as shelters, to take refuge from bad weather.
  • A dwelling: any place where you live: a house, a tent, a cave, a hut... To dwell is to live in a place (Spanish: "habitar").
    A reindeer
  • A deer: a herbivorous wild animal. Male deer have big antlers on their head. (Deer is the same word for singular and plural: one deer, eight deer).
  • Reindeer: a species of deer from the polar regions.
  • A bison: A big and strong herbivorous wild bovid, with horns on its head. Very few bisons survive today in Europe and North America.
  • A mammoth: an extinct species of hairy elephant that lived in cold regions thousands of years ago. 
  • A predator: an animal that hunts other animals for food.
    Sewing
  • Hunting: capturing and killing animals for food. 
  • A scavenger: an animal that eats animal carcasses (dead animal bodies)
  • To sew (careful! the pronunciation of this verb is exactly the same as to sow 'to plant seeds'):
    To attatch two objects using a needle and thread. Sewing is a basic skill for making clothes.
  • An animal hide: the skin of an animal when it's cleaned and treated for making clothes or  shelters. When the skin has a lot of hair and it's used for clothing, we call it fur. If it is without hair it is called leather (usually made of a cow's skin).
    A mammoth
    A predator (a cheetah) hunting a gazelle
    A European bison
    A tent made of animal hides
    We are studying the Palaeolithic period, the longest period of prehistory. 
    You can spell this name as your book does (Palaeolithic) or just Paleolithic, as in Spanish.
    We know already that the Palaeolithic period started when the first hominids appeared: about 4.4 million years ago (mya).

    This is the presentation for today's lesson.

    In this illustration you can see some Palaeolithic tools (click to see it larger)
    In this video you can see how hominids made a biface and lit fire:

    ----
    Task
    Today there is no form to answer. You're going to do an exercise instead.
    You must search for information about a palaeolithic tool and complete a table like this example:
  • Student’s name
    Víctor
    (Insert a picture here)
    Name of the tool
    Biface
    Period of prehistory
    Lower Palaeolithic
    Approxi-
    mate chronology
    Between
    900 000 and
    780 000 years ago
    Hominid species that made this tool
    (Probably) Homo heidelbergensis
    Material
    Stone
    Technique (how the tool was made)
    Knapping or carving (striking two stones against each other)
    Use of this tool
    This tool was used for various purposes: cutting wood, butchering animals, , breaking animal bones, etc.

    The deadline is Friday 3rd April, but don't worry if you have any problems, just let me know.
    I'm going to send you an e-mail containing the link to the document that you must complete.

    You're all going to work on the same document, but each one of you have to do his/her task in a different page. (Like this you can see what the others are doing so that you don't repeat the same thing). Please be careful: don't write in your other classmates' pages.  I have written your names on each one of the pages.

Thursday 26 March 2020

Unit 7 - Lesson 3. Human evolution

Sorry, I'm late at publishing today's lesson.

This lesson corresponds to pages 106-107 of your book.

This is today's presentation. I advise you to read and study page 106 of your book as well.



I would also like you to watch this short video. Use the subtitles to understand it better.


Today the form is very easy. Please complete it:

Tuesday 24 March 2020

Unit 7 - Lesson 2. Chronology and the division of prehistory

Today's lesson corresponds to page 104, sections 1.1 and 1.2 of your book.

Study the following presentation and the image below, then answer the questions of the form at the end.


As you can see in the following images, the evolution of techniques allowed hominids, then humans to produce better tools.

  • In the Palaeolithic period, people stroke stones against each other to produce cutting edges: 
  • In the Neolithic, people polished the stone and tools had a smooth surface and a more perfect edge for cutting:
  • Finally, the discovery of metalworking allowed people to make better, stronger tools.


Click here to see the full-sized timeline


Thursday 19 March 2020

Unit 7 - Lesson 1. History and historical sources

Today's lesson corresponds to pages 104-105 of your book (sections 1.1 and 1.3)

Study the following presentation.


As you have seen, historians need sources ('fuentes') for writing history.  Let's classify them according to their different nature:

A) Texts

  • Written documents
  • Oral texts

B) Material sources:

  • Fossil parts of human bodies, animals, plants…
  • Artefacts: tools, pottery, decorative objects.
  • Structures: buildings, roads, public works…
  • Works of art: paintings, sculptures…

After reading the lesson, fill in the form below.